BONHOEFFER: A PERSON FOR OUR TIMES (Post 1)

Understanding the Man and the Theology That Drove how he Resisted Hitler

Bonhoeffer is a person for our times.

Amidst a confusing cultural mess, where the re-elected Trump has made “immigrants” the scapeboat for USA’s problems, carried out executive order edicts one after the other, without any compassion or planning, and yet seems to talk like a Christian, and use Christian convictions (especially in regard to sexuality and abortion) to garner evangelical Christian support, all the while playing on grievances in the culture to coerce, abuse and strip various person groups of individual rights, Bonhoeffer and his story provides us an example for how to live. He is an exemplar for how to live and navigate oppressive and ideologized political regimes even unto to death.

Amidst the oppressive politics sweeping our country, many of us Christians are lost as to what to do. We know arguing does not accomplish much. Opening a social media account and speaking truth, as brilliant of a wordsmith as I might be, only creates an echo chamber, and stirs up the animus to new heights, which in turn stirs up the return animus to even higher heights. And yet we can’t ignore what’s happening, just look the other way, try to go on with life. We don’t want to be complicit with the evils of our time. We are dumbfounded by Christians who get behind such oppressive politics enthusiastically in Jesus’ name. They seem like such nice people. Good Christians? Damn it!! Teach us Lord how to walk through these times.

It's to this situation that Bonhoeffer’s example especially speaks to me. Through very similar times, he did not succumb to the violence and antagonisms of the cultural ideology, he did not simply turn to social media and vent and call it day, he did not turn away and ignore as much as possible to keep his life going for another day. HE LIVED a life of love, integrity, witness, and resistance. The only shame is there weren’t thousands more Bonhoeffers.

You might say Bonhoeffer is a living walking theology.

He is a person who embodied a theology, a way of knowing God in Jesus in such a way that his life was shaped as a witness resistant to the powers and principalities of evil sweeping over a people – in Nazi Germany. Maybe by just examining the theology that shaped him, we might have the wherewithal to be persons like him? Maybe we can be Bonhoeffers in large enough numbers, with multiple Finkenwalde communities, to resist the current politics, reveal its evils, and make space for the church to be the church again?

Mark Thiessen Nation’s ‘Discipleship in a World Full of Nazis’

What is Bonhoeffer’s theology? How did he live this theology through the various chapters of his life? How did this theology shape the man who lived a life resolute against the evil of Nazi cultural and political formation?

These are the questions Mark Thiessen Nation works through in his book Discipleship in a World Full of Nazis. This is the book I want to draw on to elucidate Bonhoeffer’s lived theology. Nation is interested in the “practical outworking of Bonhoeffer’s central theological commitments” (p. xvii), i.e. the theology that drove his life? What did he believe about God in such a way as to live a compelling life in resistance to the evils of Nazi Germany without entering into its violence?

Notice I said “without entering into its violence.” This of course is a major contention over Bonhoeffer’s life. Nation lets us in on his own personal journey in navigating this question. Nation started out a true believer of Bonhoeffer the assassin. He believed Bonhoeffer’s best friend Eberhard Bethge’s assessment, that Bonhoeffer had a change of heart on his commitment to nonviolence and turned to a more realist (Niebuhrian) position in the face of Hitler. It is all spellbinding. And it’s so much more than biography for an Neo-Anabaptist like me. Because it drives to the heart of the issue: how do we as Christians face the violence, the ideological oppressive forces, without entering into the violence itself?

The issue of Bonhoeffer’s complicity with Hitler’s attempted assassination is no small issue. The relation of a Jesus follower to violence is an issue which cuts to the core of our being, who we are as people living under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. How we make these discernments shapes our way of being. I see it everywhere among friends, former friends, Trumpians, Anti-Trumpians, social activists, Christian Nationalists. It cuts to the core of how we will engage the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Studying Bonhoeffer in this way therefore is not only essential, it can be life-changing.

Bonhoeffer’s Theology Starts With Jesus

In an address given in 1932, Nation quotes Bonhoeffer as saying, “From Christ alone we must know what we should do. Not, however from Him as the preaching prophet of the Sermon on the Mount, but rather from him who gives us life and forgiveness, … as the one who brings and promises the new world … With this, we are wholly directed toward Christ.” (p.67) And so it is apparent, through this text and many others, that Bonhoeffer starts with Jesus in all things. For Bonhoeffer, even before Jesus is a prophet, before he tells us the way things are and should be, Jesus is Lord, the one who brings these realities into being. If we could summarize Bonhoeffer’s formation theologically it would be “it starts with Jesus.”

But folks, who are reading me now, maybe hearing overtures from their Christian summer camp counselor, “Jesus is the answer” or “WWJD - What would Jesus do?”, what can this statement possibly mean for life and practice in the face of the Nazi regime?

1. Is this a statement about the importance of one’s personal piety and devotional life? That by reading the Bible, praying, worshiping I shall be shaped into Jesus and somehow become the kind of person capable of engaging (or at least resisting) Nazi Germany? Maybe? But we also know that personal piety can also shape us to withdraw from culture’s evils, and safeguard ourselves and our resources until Jesus comes (read James Cone on this). Bonhoeffer’s life and writings reveal much about how our devotional life shapes us for resistance.

2. Is this a statement about Jesus, the moral teacher who teaches us how to go about justice in the world. That perhaps we can take principles of justice from Jesus, and follow his commissioning to go out int the world and make this justice happen? In Jesus’ name? Maybe. There is surely something to be gained in understanding Jesus teachings and applying them to our lives. But Bonhoeffer’s life and writings, and his navigations through the perils of 1930’s Germany, challenge the notion we can make Jesus into a moral principle to be enforced in our own efforts and power. Bonhoeffer exposes the limits of such an approach to this way of Christians engaging the world.

3. Is this a statement about Jesus being the restorer of creation. That really what we must do is start with creation and seek its restoration under Jesus. Again, maybe. There’s some good in recognizing the goodness of creation, but once again Bonhoeffer’s life and writings, and his navigations through the perils of 1930’s Germany, make it apparent this approach to Jesus engaging the world has its limits. Evangelicals who are apt to start with creation as the foundation for our moral lives, can learn much from Bonhoeffer and the ways this was twisted in Nazi Germany

4. Lastly, what does this statement imply for the role of the church of Jesus in engaging the forces of evil in Nazi Germany? No one saw the failure of the German church more up close than Bonhoeffer did in 1930’s Germany. What is the church, what is its role in engaging culture for the justice of Christ? Is the church merely the space for ministering the gospel of Jesus to individual souls, allowing (and staying out of) the government to do its work? Maybe? Is the church a social justice institution teaching individuals about Jesus’ justice and then sending them out as volunteers for the work of justice in the culture? Again maybe? Is the church a space of the Rule of Christ and His presence, living the Kingdom in the power of Christ, challenging the principalities and powers via its presence in the world? Maybe? How does this work? Bonhoeffer’s ecclesiology started with his first doctoral dissertation, before the 1930’s. But it was forged in the midst of 1930’s Nazi Germany. Bonhoeffer’s life and writings, and his navigations through the perils of 1930’s Germany, answer these questions in a way that is uniquely appropriate for our time.

Four Upcoming Posts

I hope to exposit Bonhoeffer’s theology as outlined by Mark Nation’s book via these four questions. They are questions many of us are asking as Christians as we face the need for witness in our time. Bonhoeffer is a person for our time. He is not only an example to follow, his theological understandings can lead us into a discipleship for this witness of resistance during these most difficult and confusing times. Join me in these next several posts? – coming every other week? Get a copy of the book HERE. You can subscribe below for free and get notified when the new posts are published.

Blessings on this as we seek to follow Jesus in these most challenging times.